April and the Extraordinary World

There are a lot of different threads in this movie, that was the first thought that came to mind when I looked back over it. The search for a serum which can make living things (except humans) basically unkillable. All the world's most accomplished scientific minds being abducted for decades, leaving the world stuck in a coal and wood-powered age.

A family of scientists, several of whom are missing, who left their young daughter April and her talking cat behind. There's an angry, incompetent French cop pursuing April, and using a young pickpocket to do it, so then there's a romance subplot. There's a whole thing about how any scientist or engineer not abducted has been press-ganged into making mostly shitty weapons for their respective governments. I don't know if the implication is none of them are smart enough to figure out how to harness electricity, or any other kinds of fuel, or the governments simply don't care because it can't be demonstrated to be helpful for killing other people right now.

It basically comes together, all ties into the very first scene in the movie, so it isn't messy or incoherent. It's like an animated version of one of those 1940s adventure serials. The kinds of things Indiana Jones and the Rocketeer are playing off of. Or maybe Tintin's the better comparison, with the teenage protagonist and her clever pet sidekick. The weird contraptions, the chase scenes, the big villain who either wants to save the world or destroy it.

But everything does drag just a little bit too long. There are a few too many scenes reminding you the two masterminds aren't entirely on the same page, telegraphing the inevitable falling out, instead of just getting to it. The whole bit with the prison/military research lab and the mobile house is kind of interesting, but feels like a needless digression. The movie needed something to delay the final scenes a few more minutes, and that's what they came up with. Fun movie, just a bit of padding in there it doesn't need.